Not too long ago I just experienced possibly the most religious fifteen minutes I’ve ever spent on a toilet.

I managed to pick up a stomach bug or something and while there had been a few small tremors throughout the day, what I just endured was less prepared for than the Indonesian Tsunamis. In fact, I bet they sounded pretty similar.

The actual attack was a brilliant display of technical feats and pyrotechnics. I managed to get a fever, break out in a sweat and experience vertigo all from my white seat. At the end of this excruciating ablution, I had little more than my conciousness to convince me that my large intestines were still in roughly the right place.

I’m now working on replacing the fluids I lost, but apart from the occassional quiver, the enemy forces seemed to have retreated.

Opening weekend went very well. After three performances I was royaly tired, but I still didn’t get home until 3am this morning (but slept until midday). The audiences seemed to enjoy the show, and the audiences have just been getting better and better. Last night’s audience erupted into laughter often (at the right spots, which is nice), and were extremely appreciative at the end. This was partially because the audience consisted of a group of kids from the children’s theatre.

We did have one scare when two of the cast members were involved in a car accident on the way, but they made it safely to the theatre and were on stage on time for a great show. It was still a tense time, and I was even on the phone to the passenger when the accident occurred. Otherwies, my lyrics have been going well, I haven’t had any emergency ‘re-imaginings’ of lyrics yet, which is somewhat comforting. Other than a little sleep deprivation, sore legs (I stand pretty much the entire show), and a less than perfect voice, I feel pretty good.

I’ve had a few hours now today to sort out the clip of the show on the local news, and I thought I’d share it with you. Beware, you must have a fairly recent Quicktime (if you have iTunes, you should be fine).

1:22, 5.4MBs

Now let’s see if I can dig out the video tape of me on the news for the same show five years ago. Tammy, will you grant me access to your dvd burner to get this done?

Why is life so hard?

I was just double checking the record schedule for tomorrow (I have a computer based hard disk tv recorder with program guide etc, doncha know), and there is a conflict between the local news which I should be on for the show, and the debut of the promisingly mystifying reality/documentary series called The Steph Show, following yet another Neighbours celebrity trying to hit it big in the music industry.

Someone please tell me what it’s like.

No More Chances

The rehearsal period of around thirteen or so weeks has drawn to a close tonight as we ran our final dress rehearsal. It wasn’t too bad all things considered. I’ve rehearsed shows in better and worse conditions at this point. I didn’t have any prop issues tonight, remembering everything I was supposed to. Lines were better, with only very minor flubs (I don’t expect this to be the norm, unfortunately).

Tonight we firstly had a camera man from a local news show come and film a few numbers and then interview both Jessica and myself. I’ll try to grab some of that if they play it tomorrow night. We also had the photographers come and snap all the way through our run which is always a wonderful memory of the show.

I did at one point tell Koby that I wanted to return to the orchestra pit after this, or do a show playing not a leading character. I find it is extremely exhausting, but no doubt will pay off in front of an audience. That said, I’m now attached to FIVE (yes FIVE) proposed projects as Musical Director for next year. It’s entirely possible that none will happen (particularly as the group are producing fewer shows next year due to theatre renovations) but there is a good chance one will see the light of day and that will give me something to do.

Now it’s time to sleep before uni in a matter of hours and squeeze in as much of everything else that I can. This is good busy.

Second last dress rehearsal tonight, and it was a doozy. I got to the theatre just after 7 for an 8 o’clock start. It turned into a 9 o’clock start as hair and makeup took quite a while. The run, for me, was terrible, and we didn’t finish until just after midnight. I made two bad fluffs in song lyrics and fudged a few lines also. It seemed to be the night we discovered all the problems. Simple things I hadn’t thought about, like how am I going to find and apply the fake blood to my hands on stage in the blackout in the three seconds I have before the curtain opens. Don’t forget to pick up the jacket on the way to the bin. Remember the yellow bunch of flowers. Wash the blood off quickly before it stains.

The second plant I puppet is a nightmare from a logistic standpoint. I have only maybe half a minute to get it all on and strapped up before I go onstage. Tonight I couldn’t keep my arm within the jacket. I think a puffy jacket would have been much better at hiding any stray arm rather than a stretched cardigan. Don’t say anything, people will only get upset.

Remember to have your bandages applied before “Closed for Renovation”. Be careful of your body mic when wearing the finale headpiece. Most of all, don’t tread on people’s toes and don’t take any offense from the highly-strung people around you. Just do your thing.